Q&A for How to Clean and Maintain Your Flute

You need to get a spray to clean your mouthpiece. It's called Giardinelli Magic Mist Hygienic Mouthpiece Cleaner. Spray it on your mouthpiece, and wipe it off with a soft cloth. This will disinfect your mouthpiece.

You could try using some toothpaste on a piece of cloth and rubbing it in gently, but it is not recommended if the rust is near any keys or pads, as toothpaste literally destroys pads. Otherwise, just get it professionally cleaned, it only costs about $15.

Use a microfiber cleaning cloth to wipe the oil off your flute.

All you need to do is hold the mouthpiece, and gently twist it out. Then do the same with the tail piece, cleaning the keys you press with your pinkies. Then you can insert a large cleaning wand, or run a cleaning cloth through and you are all set.

You can remove tarnish using a polishing cloth. If that doesn't work, take it to a professional cleaner.

Soak it in cool or warm (not hot) water, and use your hands to help agitate the cloth and release the grime. Rinse well and let air-dry.

There is no DIY fix to this. You need to take your flute into the shop and have it examined and fixed by a professional to prevent further damage.

No, you can't ever let your flute get wet! Letting a woodwind instrument get wet will ruin the tarnish and make the pads swell and quit working.

You should clean it as often as necessary, but be sure to apply it with care. Although the rubbing alcohol itself shouldn't damage the flute, applying it too frequently and too vigorously will cause damage.

Take it to a flute repair technician as there is nothing you can do yourself to remove them.

Use a small amount of WD-40, then clean it with a dampened cloth of alcohol or water.

If it happens to get stuck in your flute, try sticking your index finger into one end of the flute and try to move the rod and rag out of the other end. If that does not work, I would try to take another separate rod and carefully try to push the rag and the other rod out.

Tune up your flute twice a year to get it polished, see if the cork is good, if everything is working right, etc. If your instrument breaks, do not try to fix it yourself. Take it to a professional to fix.

Unfortunately, there is no DIY to this. You need to get the pads replaced by taking it to a flute repair technician.

With the use of a tuner, you play a note. If you're sharp, pull out the head joint. If you're flat, push the head joint in. The most common tuning now is low A.

It would probably be best to take it to a professional to be cleaned, because the smell is most likely coming from mold inside of the flute from not cleaning it.

If the rust is away from the pads, use the methods in the article. If not, take it to the music store and they will fix it.

Use a silver polishing cloth made particularly for instruments to avoid damaging the finish.

It is used for cleaning small spaces like under the keys. You can use water instead.

You put the end of the tuning rod with the lines inside the head joint, and if the mouth piece is centered the lines will be right in the middle.

Use a mouthpiece spray such as Giardinelli Magic Mist Hygienic Mouthpiece Cleaner, Players Products Magic Mist Mouthpiece Spray, or Roche Thomas Mi-T Mist Mouthpiece Cleaner.

At this point, the best option is to either buy a new flute or take it to a professional to get it fixed. If you try fixing it on your own, you risk damaging the flute.

You shouldn't wash your flute with water. Instead, polish it with a dry cloth. If you the flute requires additional cleaning to remove tarnish, take it to a professional cleaner.

Twist the crown back and forth until it pushes the line on the end of the rod to the center.

Firstly, you're not supposed to stick the rod into the body of the flute with the cloth. You're supposed to take the cloth off of the rod and put the rod inside the body of the flute. Then, before you close the case, neatly fold the cloth and place it on top of the flute parts. Then close the case. To remove the cloth, just take a pair of tweezers and tug lightly on the cloth.

Some pads can't be fixed if they're leaking and simply just need to be replaced. You may find it's cheaper to get a brand new flute off of Amazon.

It's possible, but it's not recommended. Polish can cause the keys to get stuck together or otherwise damage your flute.

Get a cloth and soak it in warm water. Ring it out and rub the sticky area.

Twisting the cork around in the head joint will not actually do any damage. You may have moved the cork and put the flute out of tune. Use the end of your cleaning rod to check. The notched line should line up with the middle of the hole on the mouthpiece. Twist the metal top to adjust the cork.

The straight flute is the standard style of tap, designed for a range of different tapping applications. It can be especially beneficial when cutting short chipping material such as cast iron. A straight flute tap can be used in through or blind holes.